


living in a van

by caramelcaramelcaramel



Series: spideychelle week 2020 babey [1]
Category: Marvel, Marvel Cinematic Universe, Spider-Man (Tom Holland Movies), Spider-Man - All Media Types
Genre: 4.5k words, Alcohol, Artist Michelle Jones, Because I said so that's why, Best Friends, But shhh, Domestic Fluff, Drunken Kissing, F/M, Fluff, Friends to Lovers, Friendship, Living Together, Minor Pepper Potts/Tony Stark, Moving In Together, Not Actually Unrequited Love, One Shot, Only One Bed, POV First Person, POV Peter Parker, Peter lives in a van, Peter uses patreon, Road Trip Prompt, Road Trips, Slow Burn, Spideychelle, Spideychelle Week 2020, Tony Stark Acting as Peter Parker's Parental Figure, although I suppose that's redundant bc when is peter not supportive, as much as you can have a slow burn in, bc you gotta pay rent somehow am i right, checks notes, kind of?, nobody needs to know, supportive peter parker
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-21
Updated: 2020-06-21
Packaged: 2021-03-03 19:20:53
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,603
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24620731
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/caramelcaramelcaramel/pseuds/caramelcaramelcaramel
Summary: more specifically, what happens when you're living in a van with your crush of ten yearsfolllow me on twitter for updates on new chapters or on tumblr for general writing stuff including writing lil pieces and taking requests!
Relationships: Betty Brant/Ned Leeds, Michelle Jones/Peter Parker
Series: spideychelle week 2020 babey [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1780090
Comments: 2
Kudos: 43
Collections: Spideychelle Week 2020





	living in a van

**Author's Note:**

> ngl, this is inspired by van life tiktoks. I don't have anything to say for myself.

“Yeah, I have a week off next month, I can drive over then,” I said, cell phone pinned between my cheek and my shoulder as I assembled my dinner.

“Sweet! I got a bonus at work, so I bought the UCS Millennium Falcon LEGO set.”

“What?” I asked, almost dropping my phone. “How?”

“Got lucky on eBay-”

There was a knock on the door of my van. “Uh, hold on one sec, Ned.”

I put my things down, and walked all the way from the kitchen to the door, one whole step. Perks of van life.

I opened the door, and it slid to the side. There was MJ, standing in the rain, with a small suitcase next to her.

“Can I crash here tonight?”

I blinked, and stepped aside to let her in. “What happened?”

She shook her head, water dripping from her soaked curls. “Landlord hiked rent without warning. I spent most of today moving my stuff into a storage unit until I can figure out what to do, but I need a place to stay for the night.”

“Of course, MJ. Uh, just give me one sec.” I picked up my phone again. “I gotta go, Ned.”

“Yeah, no problem. I’ll text you tomorrow.”

“Sounds good, dude. Tell Betty I say hi.”

“Will do. Night.”

“Night.” I hung up. “Okay, here, I’ll help you set up.”

I helped her unpack, and put her suitcase in the back of the van, under the mattress. My designated storage space.

“You take the bed,” I told her. “I’ll sleep on the floor.”

She looked at me, face unreadable. If we’re being honest, she was usually hard to read.

But then she blinked, and seemed to snap out of it. “You’re sure?”

“Em, you look like you had a rough day. You need the sleep.”

Her shoulders dropped a bit. “I hate you when you’re right.”

“It doesn’t happen often. Have you eaten?”

She shook her head, so I went back to assembling dinner as she used the bathroom. It was basically a 2x2 waterproofed box with both a showerhead and a toilet in it. She took a shower, and came out in a towel.

“Sorry,” she mumbled.

“It’s alright.”

“Uh, don’t turn around,” she said. I kept my eyes trained on the meal I was preparing, and listened to the rustle of clothing. “Alright, it’s safe.”

“Oh, good, had I seen any of your skin, my eyes would’ve burned out of my sockets.”

She came up next to me, lightly smacking my shoulder. “Like an angel in it’s true form?” She grinned smugly.

I rolled my eyes, and handed her her plate. “Dinner is served.”

“Thank you, Peter.” She leaned over and kissed my cheek, before settling down on the floor, back against the bed. “Seriously, thank you for letting me crash. I know you don’t have a ton of space.”

“Of course,” I told her, settling down next to her. I had a dining table I could pull out, and a chair I could unfold, but the space next to her seemed more inviting. “Stay as long as you need.” I stabbed my dinner with my fork and took a bite. “Besides, I’ve lived with you, and I’ve lived with Ned and Betty. I would much rather you as a roommate.”

She laughed lightly, and I was reminded of why we couldn’t stay roommates. Namely, the butterflies in my stomach, flapping around as she laughed.

“Thank you, Peter.”

“No, I’m serious. Ned steals my toothpaste.” He didn’t (well, not often), but I wanted to hear her laugh again.

And she did, covering her mouth with her hand.

We ate the rest of dinner. Well, I did. MJ was yawning by the time she was halfway through, and asleep, head leaning on my shoulder before she was three-fourths of the way through.

I scooped her up, and tucked her into bed. Thank goodness for spidey-strength, right? I cleaned up the remains of dinner, and pulled an extra blanket down from a cupboard over the bed. I didn’t have any extra pillows, so I grabbed one of my hoodies and used that.

The floor was surprisingly comfortable, and I fell asleep quickly.

Over the course of the next few days, MJ and I fell into a comfortable rhythm. Perhaps it was easy because we had been roommates in college. She picked up her old chores, and I did mine. We took turns taking nights in the bed, and I had bought a roll-up floor mattress that stored well under my desk, so nights on the floor were more comfortable.

I drove to pick her up from work at the end of the week. She got in, looking frustrated.

“Bad day?”

“I don’t qualify for my next raise for another six months, maybe a year depending on how my pieces do. And I guess I’m the only one who missed the memo about literally every one-bedroom or studio apartment driving rent way up. And I’m fucking angry because I know that I’m getting paid less than George and Terry, who both have literally the exact same job as I do, but they’re white guys so they’re worth more.” She groaned, pinching the bridge of her nose. “I just don’t know how I’m going to be able to afford a new place.”

It came out of my mouth before I could stop it. “Move in here.”

“No, Peter, there’s not enough space-”

“Bullshit,” I said, and it caught her off guard. “We’ve been functioning just fine all week. Car insurance on this thing is dirt-cheap. We can make some adjustments to make more space for your stuff.”

“I don’t want to intrude on-”

“I’m _offering_.” She still looked unsure, so I put a hand on her shoulder, squeezing lightly. “Em. I promise. I would be happy to have you.”

We had a long conversation about it when we got back to the RV campground I usually stayed at. I explained the budget and costs to her. A monthly pass to the campground was less than half of her rent, and the car insurance was nothing compared to utilities. By the end of the evening, I had her convinced.

The next day, we reorganized the van, and went by the storage space to move in the rest of her things. There wasn’t much, so I wasn’t too worried about not having enough space.

By Sunday, the van had been rearranged, slightly redecorated (MJ had much better taste than I did, and I couldn’t even pretend to deny it), and our space was optimized. We’d build a little barricade on the bed out of the roll-up mattress, so we could both sleep in the bed all the time. I’d shown MJ how to empty the grey tank and the toilet cassette, where everything was, how things unfolded and folded back up.

We opened a bottle of wine Sunday night, to celebrate all of our productivity.

“We got so much done this weekend,” MJ mused, pouring my glass.

“I told you living together was a good idea.”

She narrowed her eyes at me. “Don’t push it.” She poured her own glass, and set the wine bottle back on the kitchen counter. “Alright. Bottoms up.”

We clinked glasses, and drank.

Our routine was simple. We drove to the Bugle HQ in the morning. MJ went to work for the day, I worked from the van on Stark Industries stuff, or patrolled if there was a lot of activity in the city. I picked her up at the end of the day, and we either went back to the campground, or she ran errands while I patrolled.

It was nice.

Everything about it was perfect, except for the barrier between us at night.

I often found myself awake at night, staring at the ceiling, listening to her breathe as she slept. She made cute little noises when she shifted in her sleep, and mumbled nonsense phrases.

How bad would it be if I took the barrier down and pulled her into my arms?

Likely disastrous.

So instead, I hugged a spare pillow, burying my face in it, or scroll through her Tumblr, wondering what it’d be like to be one of her subjects.

She spent a lot of time people-gazing. She’d been like that since high school. She’d sit on benches at parks, and sketch people with their dogs, partners, or their phones.

And over the course of the last ten years, she’d amassed quite a following. Something like forty thousand people, all admiring her art.

Sorry, forty thousand and one. One hopeless dumbass who lived in a van and spent his spare time doing backflips on rooftops in a red onesie.

And then, a couple weeks into living together, her blog blew up. It went from forty thousand to eighty thousand overnight, and then up to two hundred thousand the next day.

One of those big Instagram pages had posted her art, and it’d given her a huge boost.

She was sitting on the bed, cross legged, hair held up in a bun with a charcoal pencil, laptop balanced on her knee. I was sitting at the dining table with my notebook, sketching out a new suit design.

“Peter?”

“Mhm?”

“Should I make a Patreon?”

I looked up at her, confused.

“I mean, I’m assuming you know more about it than I do, Spider-Man.”

She wasn’t wrong. In college, I’d made a Patreon to help me pay rent. The $1 tier got weekly selfies from weird spots in NYC, the $5 tier got to request a backflip on top of any building, stuff like that. I mentioned at some point that if I got to a billion patrons, I’d do a face reveal, but obviously it’d never happened.

It was a nice source of income now, though. I didn’t necessarily need it, since I was Mr. Stark’s right-hand man, and my paycheque was nothing to scoff at, but growing up on the edge of poverty had made me super frugal. I could probably afford to live in a penthouse, but I just chose the van instead. And I liked it, if we were being completely honest. It was convenient, and kept me organized. Maybe at some point I’d go back to living in an apartment, but I didn’t see the need to for now.

“Well, um, Patreon takes a cut. For your purposes, ko-fi is likely better.”

“Oh, yeah, and I could take commissions through ko-fi.”

I nodded.

“Thanks, Peter.”

“Yeah, no problem.”

She spent the rest of the evening on her laptop, and then went to sleep early. I cleaned the kitchen, mostly just to do something before I went to bed.

The next morning, I dropped her off at work, and then went to the Stark Industries HQ. Mr. Stark and I tinkered with some prototypes the whole day, taking breaks to answer emails.

“How’s living with MJ going?” he asked, standing up for the first time in hours, and wiping the grease off his hands.

It caught me off guard. “Oh, um, it’s fine. Yeah.”

“So, you’re not losing sleep by pining the whole night?”

“No, no no. That’s- no, I’m fine.”

“Really? Because that screwdriver is three sizes too small for that screw, and you’ve been trying to screw it in for ten minutes.”

I glanced down, and realized my error. “I, uh, I meant to-”

Mr. Stark pulled a chair over, sitting on it backwards and leaning on the back of it. “Why won’t you just tell her how you feel?”

I shook my head, grabbing the correct screwdriver, and getting back to my project. “And screw up my closest friendship? No, thank you.”

“Or,” he said, “marry her in a few years.”

“Don’t get my hopes up.”

“I said the same thing to Rhodey about Pepper.”

I glanced up, and he was smiling. Mr. Stark had this Pepper SmileTM and here he was, smiling that smile right now.

I groaned. “We’re going on a road trip to see Ned and Betty this weekend. I can’t exactly drop that bomb on her, and then spend three hours in the van with her. What would I even say? ‘Hey, MJ, I’ve had a thing for you since junior year and I never acted on it because I’m pretty sure you’re the best thing in my life and I couldn’t risk losing you so instead I’ve pined after you for ten years which is borderline creepy. Date me!’”

Mr. Stark stared at me for a moment, then ran his hand down his face. “Okay, I’m gonna go make you an omelet, and then put you in touch with my therapist.”

After work, I went and picked up MJ. When I got there, she was sitting on a bench with a box, filled to the brim with folders.

Oh, no.

I rolled down the window. “What happened?”

She looked up from her phone, and grabbed the box, coming towards the van. She had a certain look I’d only seen a few times. Fire behind her eyes.

She got in, setting the box down at her feet with a huff. “I got fired.”

“What?”

She shrugged. “I asked for my raise, they turned me down, I asked how much my male colleagues were making, they lied, I pulled up proof and demanded my raise again, and they fired me.”

“Holy shit.”

“I published everything on their website though, and made sure it went up on the Wayback Machine, so it’s out there. I’ve proven the wage gap.”

“Not bad for a day’s work.”

She snorted. “Not to mention, I got a pretty sweet severance package. Six month’s salary.”

“That’s not bad at all. Geez, Em.”

She looked over at me, smiling. “I feel good.”

My heart skipped a beat, and I turned back to the road. “So, what’s the plan?”

“Well, overnight, I got a pretty good Patreon following going. Like, enough to cover living expenses. And I can take commissions for extra income. So I might just be freelancing for a while.”

“Why don’t you make a YouTube or something? Generate some more income via ads.”

“I’ll think about it,” MJ said. Not in that dismissive way that people tend to say it, either.

We got back to the campground, and hung out for the evening. We ordered in a pizza, to celebrate, and I helped MJ sort through her box from the office. Some of the files had some proof of sexism and racism, so we kept them. Just in case.

“Have you gotten any commission requests yet?” I asked.

She nodded, thumbing through the pages of a file. “A whole bunch. I’ll sort through which ones to take tomorrow.”

“What did you offer on your Patreon?” She looked up at me. “Out of curiosity.”

She went back to the file in her hand. “The first tier is access to reference photos I take, the second is process videos, the third is short tutorials, and I might open one where you get, like, monthly postcards.”

“Wow. Look at you go. You’re really killing it.”

She smiled, first still looking at the file in her hands, then looking up at me. “Thanks, Peter.” She cleared her throat. “And, um, thanks for taking me in and being so supportive.”

I smiled back. “Of course, Em.” When that didn’t seem to be enough, I added, “What are friends for?”

She put the file down and hugged me, tight. I was a little taken aback, and it took me a full three seconds to register what was happening and hug her back.

It was because MJ wasn’t a hugger, not because my heart was pounding out of my chest. That’s my story and I’m sticking to it.

She squeezed me a little. “I’m really lucky.”

I buried my face in her hair. “Me too.”

When we pulled apart, I made an excuse about wanting to rest up for the road trip tomorrow, and turned in early. She stayed up for another hour or two, drawing on her tablet. When she wasn’t looking, I stole glances.

She was drawing _me_.

I didn’t sleep a whole lot that night.

In the morning, I called Ned and Betty, to let them know we were on our way to Baltimore. As MJ got up, showered, and went through the rest of her routine, I checked the van to make sure everything was secured. We got into the seats at the front at the same time.

“You ready?”

“Oh, wait, let me make sure I didn’t forget anything at home,” MJ joked.

“Ha ha.” I started the van, and we got on the road.

I had some soft music on, and for a while MJ was bobbing her head along to it, but then she seemed to wilt.

“You okay?” I asked.

She nodded. “Just tired.”

“Why don’t you go lay down?” I asked. “I can wake you up when we get to Ned and Betty’s.”

“And leave you alone up here? No, sir.”

I pressed my lips together so I didn’t smile.

Another few minutes passed, and I realized she was starting to doze off.

“Em, go lay down.”

“Mm, in a second.”

But then she was out.

And god, she was beautiful. The morning light was kissing her skin, turning it gold. Her curls were nestled around her face, framing it perfectly. Well, except for one piece, that had fallen across her face.

There were no other cars on the road, so I placed one hand on top of the wheel and gingerly reached over, glancing between the road ahead and MJ, and moved the hair out of her face.

I half-expected her to wake up, and maybe I wanted to, but she stayed still.

She slept for about an hour, before she slowly blinked her eyes open.

“I almost fell asleep.”

I snorted. Typical MJ.

“How far away are we?”

“About an hour and a half.”

She groaned softly. “Why did they move all the way to Baltimore?”

“Blame Betty,” I answered. “Do you wanna take the AUX cord?”

“Always.”

She plugged in her phone, and started up her music.

MJ had this knack for finding amazing music. Stuff I never would’ve listened to on my own, or looked for on my own, but once I did listen to it, I loved it.

I spent the second half of the drive vibing to MJ’s music, us chatting idly on and off. We stopped and got coffee when we were about twenty minutes from Ned and Betty, making sure to grab some muffins for them, too.

We arrived, pulling into their driveway (a foreign concept for a born and raised New Yorker such as myself), and they were already running out the front door. Betty practically tackled MJ in a hug, and Ned ran up and did our handshake with me before pulling me into a tight hug.

“Oh, I missed you,” I admitted.

“I missed you too.”

We pulled away, and I went over to Betty, hugging her. “How’ve you been?”

“Really good. You?” she asked, pulling back. “Still pining?” She dropped her voice, but I still felt a jolt of anxiety.

I nodded.

“Living together must be great.”

“Yeah!” MJ cut in. “We’ve been really good.”

I smiled. “We have.”

“Oh! Let me grab the muffins,” MJ said, running back to the van.

Ned and Betty both looked at me with the same pity, before looking at each other. MJ came back, handing the paper bag to Betty. “Lemon poppyseed and a blueberry muffin for you, Ned.”

“Oh, you’re the best!” He snatched the bag from Betty, plunging his hand into it to retrieve the muffin.

“Come on in,” Betty said, waving us along. “You must be tired.”

“I napped on the way,” MJ admitted.

“Yeah, you’re driving back, by the way,” I responded.

She grinned. “Whatever you say, Parker.”

I locked the van, and we followed Ned and Betty inside.

It was clear Betty had been the one to decorate. Fairy lights wrapped around the legs of the tables, macramé tablecloth, white or light beige furniture, watercolour art on the wall.

Of course, MJ was drawn to the art on the wall like a moth to a flame. She and Betty discussed those while Ned showed me to his office, and we unboxed his Millennium Falcon set.

“Oh, you have to show me the ring,” I said.

“Shh!” He went to his desk, unlocked a drawer, and pulled a small, white velvet box out of it. “Okay, so, she told Liz, in, like, high school, that she hates white diamonds, so I bought her a pink diamond.” He handed me the box.

It was a really nice ring. Oval cut, simple silver band.

“Betty’s gonna love this,” I assured him. “First of all, it’ll go with every other piece of jewelry I’ve ever seen her wear, and second, she loves you, so she’ll love it.”

“I’m nervous,” Ned admitted, taking the box and putting it back in the drawer.

“You’ve been together for almost ten years. She obviously wants to spend her life with you, Ned!”

“I know, I know, but I don’t know at the same time.”

We kept combing through pieces. “Yeah, I get that.”

“Speaking of,” Ned said, “what’s with you and MJ?”

“What do you mean?”

“You promised me when you moved out last time that if you ever lived with her again, it’d be as a couple.”

Shit. I forgot about that. “Right, well, um, it wasn’t exactly plan-”

“Yeah, I got that part. But dude, seriously. You’re torturing yourself. Why do you refuse to tell her how you feel?”

I shook my head. “It’s not that simple.”

“Why not?”

I looked at him. “I don’t have many people. You, Betty, Mr. Stark, May, MJ. Happy on a good day. Harry won’t speak to me since I called him out for being sexist at a party. You and Betty live three hours away and have your own life, May and Happy are off being happily married, and Mr. Stark is my boss. I need a friend.”

Ned looked down, like the LEGO pieces were the most interesting thing in the world. “Makes sense, I guess.”

“Yeah, I guess I’m just…scared to lose that. She’s the best thing in my life most days. And yeah, it’d be better if we were together, I’d be happier, but…I don’t know that I’d be okay if she weren’t around.”

Ned nodded.

“I just can’t afford to mess that up.”

Betty burst through the office door, face flushed pink. “Okay, MJ and I are doing shots in the kitchen, and you’re gonna join us.”

“What-”

Before I’d registered it, Betty was grabbing our hands and pulling us to our feet. “Come on! Let loose!”

We followed her, and MJ was standing at the counter, pouring something blue into shot glasses. She saw me and grinned, and handed me a shot glass.

“You’re insane,” I told her.

“Do the shot, Parker.”

I rolled my eyes, but threw it back. Before I’d finished swallowing it, MJ had grabbed the shot glass and was refilling it.

“Is this a good idea?”

MJ nodded. “Tonight’s a black-out kind of night, don’t you think?”

Ned nodded, a now-empty shot glass in his hand. “Absolutely.”

A voice in the back of my head warned me that this was a bad idea, but the idea of drowning my problems in blue alcohol was too tempting. “Definitely.”

The four of us did about four shots each, and then Betty turned on some music. MJ and Betty danced together, and Ned and I played darts in the corner.

I kept stealing glances of them. MJ was beautiful. Arms in the air, smile on her face, dancing like she didn’t have a care in the world.

“Your turn,” Ned reminded me.

I threw a dart.

Ned only played me in darts when I was drunk. Sober Peter was had super-accuracy. Drunk Peter was a normal human being, at least in terms of accuracy. It was still an advantage when Ned was also drunk, but less of one than if I were sober, I suppose.

We weren’t really keeping score, which I guess was nice. I wasn’t paying close enough attention.

As I was watching Ned throw his darts, I felt a hand on my shoulder. I turned to see a wobbly MJ, handing me another shot.

Why not?

I smiled, throwing it back. “Thanks.”

“No problem.”

I liked drunk MJ. She was smiley, almost giddy, so full of life. She bounced rather than walked. She danced big, rather than her usual subtle bobbing head, tapping fingers.

I liked her when she was inhibited. It was like seeing a glimpse of who she was, rather than who she wanted others to see.

A slow song came on, and Betty pulled Ned into a more spacious part of the room so they could slow dance.

MJ and I leaned against the counter next to each other.

“Do you ever wonder what it’s like?” she asked, voice soft in a way it wasn’t often.

“What?”

“Being in love like that?”

I looked at her. Her cheeks were flushed, her hair messy and yet somehow perfect, lips shiny and soft-looking.

_No. No, I love you with every fibre of my being, every ounce of my soul. I haven’t had to wonder what it feels like to be in love for ten years, because I have you, and you don’t even know it. You are so perfect and beautiful and easy to love, and I’m a fool for not saying it and loving you as hard as I can._

But I couldn’t say that, could I?

So instead, I turned her face towards me, and kissed her.

It occurred to me that she was the first girl I’d kissed since college, when I’d messily hooked up with Gwen Stacy at some frat party.

It also occurred to me that she was kissing me back, and that shocked me.

I broke the kiss.

“I, um, think I need some sleep.”

“Peter-”

“Sorry,” I mumbled.

I grabbed my keys and went out the front door, crawling into bed without changing or brushing my teeth or anything.

 _Fuck_.

An hour or so passed, and I sobered up significantly. I couldn’t stop thinking about it.

How fucking stupid was I?

Seriously, how dumb was I? Kissing my roommate in front of our best friends while drunk and-

What the fuck was I _thinking?_ This was MJ, after all. Cynical, distant, too-cool-for-me MJ.

And I’d just fucked up ten years of perfectly uncool, undistant, uncynical friendship.

Fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck, fuck-

The van door opened.

“Peter?” She was slurring a little, and her voice was soft and…vulnerable, almost. “Are you still awake?”

I thought about laying still, taking slow, deep breaths, pretending to be asleep. But I sat up. “Yeah.”

I expected her to ask to talk about what happened, but instead she ran at the bed, tackling me. I hit the bed with an audible _oof_ and stared up at her. Her eyes were wide and sparkly.

“You kissed me.”

I blinked. “Yeah.”

“Do it again.”

I slid my hands around her face, fingers buried in her hair, thumbs against her cheeks, and kissed her.

The weight of her body was comforting as she sank into me, kissing me deeply.

I smiled against her lips.

And to think, all of this because an asshole landlord hiked up rent and a racist boss enforced a wage gap.

**Author's Note:**

> hopefully you enjoyed my version of spideychelle week day one! it's not very heavy on the road trip part of the...road trip prompt, but hey if it's okay with you guys, i'm happy :) stay tuned for the soulmate au prompt


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